Delta CEO: 'We are supporters of the 2nd Amendment'

Delta's CEO says the company supports the Second Amendment.CEO Ed Bastian said in a memo to employees Friday t...

Posted: Mar. 2, 2018 7:47 AM

Updated: Mar. 2, 2018 12:01 PM

Delta's CEO says the company supports the Second Amendment.

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CEO Ed Bastian said in a memo to employees Friday that the company's goal was to "remain neutral" in the debate over guns.

The airline ended a discount for the NRA after the school shooting in Florida. That angered Georgia Republican lawmakers, who stripped a tax break for Delta out of a bill they were considering.

"Our people and our customers have a wide range of views on how to increase safety in our schools and public places, and we are not taking sides," Bastian wrote in a memo to employees.

"We are supporters of the 2nd-Amendment, just as we embrace the entire Constitution of the United States," Bastian wrote.

On Saturday, Delta ended a discount for NRA members flying to their annual meeting.

The decision prompted Georgia Republicans to remove the tax break, an exemption for jet fuel that would have been worth about $50 million to Delta. Governor Nathan Deal, a Republican, said he would sign the bill without the exemption.

"Our home is Atlanta and we are proud and honored to locate our headquarters here," Bastian wrote.

Delta was one of roughly a dozen companies that cut ties with the NRA after 17 students and staff were shot to death at a high school in Florida.